Jon Gertner

In addition to writing books, I’m a longtime contributing writer at the New York Times Magazine. My journalism and book reviews have also appeared in Wired, The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. My magazine stories tend to address contemporary issues in science, technology, and business; my books focus more on historical episodes that have had a significant but underappreciated influence. To put it slightly differently: In longer projects, I’m trying to pay close attention to certain aspects of our past so we can better understand the present, and perhaps the future. My first book, The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation (Penguin Press, 2012) chronicles a generation of scientists working at the 20th Century’s greatest laboratory and explores the importance of technological innovation. The Ice at the End of the World, (Random House, 2019) details 150 years of exploration and investigation on the Greenland ice sheet, beginning in the 1880s. A story about the process of scientific discovery, the book aims to tell how the work in Greenland, aided by an evolving array of technological tools, has led us to a profound understanding of our current climate crisis. My next book for Random House will examine NASA’s long-running Voyager mission—its engineering, scientific observations, and legacy. The book will likewise explore the underlying principles of long-term projects and durability.